Until I Kill You

This is an excellent series. Great acting from the leads; superbly cast.

Definitely a binge set, you won't be able to push the pause button.

All the settings are very authentic looking and time adjusted extremely well.

Shaun Evans just continues to improve in his acting ability (Male lead). In this series he is unbelievably good. At times, the hairs on the back of your neck will stand up and shiver.

Anna Maxwell Martin continues to impress immensely (Female lead). She is incredibly convincing in her role.

I'm certainly not going to add any spoilers, I think that is the worse thing you can do, especially if the series or movie is a good one. If you want to find out what happens, watch it.

Tremendous! Thoroughly recommended 8/10.

Top notch performances from everyone involved, made for uncomfortable viewing at times, but also gripping television. I often wince at real life dramas because they sweeten things for one side or the other. In this case you felt they gave a fair representation of both sides. I don't remember the original story so it felt quite fresh for me.

We binged the programme, and never intended to, so that says something. The fact it felt so underwhelming made it even more believable and the pacing as we moved through the key components of the story maintained the tension, I would recommend this as a quality piece of TV.

Engaging story and great acting. The lead actress's dialect did not bother me as it did others but it was definitely noticeable. She did an incredible job though. Great acting by the lead actress and everyone else.

I'd read an article that while working on the script the writer worried about how people would find empathy or be on the side of someone.with an "unconventional personality." She was quirky for sure. I didn't find that distractive though. I did however find her abusive to the people trying to help her. I found it difficult to watch because she was quite simply not a likable person. That does not mean she deserved anything that happened to her or that she caused it in any way. It just means it's understandably challenging to tell her story. Others have pointed out that she would of course have anger. I agree. But that anger was directed at other people. People that cared about her and were trying to help. For me this made the series difficult to watch.

Not only is this a compelling, uncomfortable drama, one almost unique in not seeking to exploit misogynistic violence for kicks, but also an indictment of a judicial system where everyone involved is clearly compromised by seeing the victim as a means to their end career-wise. The police want a conviction and the criminal is the target and the victim is merely the enabling ammunition to achieve this; a passive cipher best forgotten afterwards unless they become useful again.

The viewer is also forced to confront their expectations of a true-crime victim. Typically these are vulnerable and quite passive individuals lacking confidence and not infrequently conventionally attractive as film and television producers seek to manipulate empathy from their audiences by all means at their disposal. Delia Balmer/Anna Maxwell Martin does not bow to this convention and the syrup-free drama is all the better for presenting a victim in the round.

As a story, 'Before I Kill You' is rather depressing: a true tale of a psychopath who murdered two women, and nearly killed a third. In fact, what makes it more interesting is even more depressing: it shows us how abusers identify victims who are vulnerable and how badly those who survive can be damaged by their experience. What makes it worth watching is the excellent performance by Anna Maxwell-Martin, who plays a woman who is something of a misfit even before the murderer targets her. We're all to dramas where all sympathetic characters are cuddly and "nice"; the protagonist here is much harder to love, although of course she deserves none of what she has to go through. I hope that the real Delia Balmer has finally managed to rebuild her life, and is happy with her portrayal on screen (if it is accurate, I reckon she will be).